The present invention relates generally to the manufacture of electronic devices and more specifically to the mounting of a circuit board within a chassis using a standoff.
All computer chassis are designed to fit different motherboards therein. Within a chassis, a slot in the chassis generally supports one end of a motherboard, and a rigidly fixed metal standoff is either pressed or screwed into the chassis. The position of the rigidly fixed standoff is pre-determined by the geometry of the motherboard and location of a mounting hole therein. Alternatively, the motherboard may be manufactured to fit within the chassis accordingly. The position of the rigidly fixed standoff must be such that when the motherboard is in the slot, the mounting hole aligns with the standoff. The standoff is then inserted into the mounting hole.
Motherboards vary in size and may have mounting holes in varying locations with respect to the computer chassis when mounted. This causes inefficiencies in the production of electronic devices, such as computers, because the position of a standoff within a computer chassis might be disposed to support a motherboard of one size or type, but not another. For instance, the standoffs for the motherboards of GATEWAY(trademark), FLEX(trademark), and MICRO(trademark) are close together, but not in the same position. As a result, generally a chassis must be custom built to match a specific type of motherboardxe2x80x94a practice that is both inconvenient and cost inefficient. For example, a company must project sales of a particular product in order to determine how many custom chassis to build of a particular type. But incorrect projections often result in either a surplus of unsold product or an inability to meet market demand. As such, it would be more convenient and cost effective to build a chassis capable of housing more than one product or motherboard type. Therefore, one alternative has been to fix two or more standoffs within the same chassis. Fixing multiple standoffs, however, is also inconvenient and cost inefficient because the unused standoffs must be removed later in production. Thus, there is a need to be able to mount different motherboards within the same computer chassis.
In general, a slidable standoff is positioned by moving it within a channel of a mounting assembly that mounts the standoff to a chassis. By being slidable, the standoff may be positioned to accommodate different types and sizes of motherboards.
Other systems, methods, features and advantages of the invention will be or will become apparent to one with skill in the art upon examination of the following figures and detailed description. It is intended that all such additional systems, methods, features and advantages be included within this description, be within the scope of the invention, and be protected by the accompanying claims.